China’s J-35 Carrier Fighter Appears; Step To ‘Most Powerful Navy’? (2024)

KYIV:China’s Navy has taken another step toward eliminating the last advantagesthat the US Navy enjoys, in the form of the new, stealthy carrier fighteraircraft known as the J-35.

What has caught the attention of US defense policymakers is the J-35’s appearance at the aircraft carrier building in Wuhan, Hubei Province that performs research for PLAN naval aviation operations. The photo is the latest of images taken of the Wuhan facility over the years by Chinese aviation enthusiasts and then posted anonymously on various PRC-based websites. Many times these photos are deleted as they constitute violations of Beijing’s pathologically secretive and pervasive military security guidelines.

“The J-35 may well representanother significant milestone in the Chinese long-term pursuit of ablue-water carrier based naval aviation capability”, said retired US naval intelligence officer, Capt. JamesFanell. Looking back over a longcareer as the most-senior retired analyst in charge of PLANassessments, he says “we are seeing the goals of [nowretired] Admiral Wu Shengli coming to fruitionas the PLAN continues itstransformation into the most powerful navy on the planet.”

The ShenyangAircraftCorporation aircraft has existed as an actual flying platform since 2011,after which it progressed through three major design iterations and severaldesignators (F-60/J-31/FC-31), until appearing as the J-35aircraft with are-configured wing and an elongated fuselage optimised for a lower radar crosssection (RCS).

The J-35’s first public appearance was as the J-31 at the 2014 Air Show Chinaexpo.This model was fitted withtwo underpoweredRussian-made engines originally developed for the MikoyanMiG-29.But even this earlier configuration already appeared to be a twin-engine adaptation of the US LockheedMartin F-35’sdesign.

Another Step On the Long March

The J-35’semergence is not just a major step in the Chinese industry’s march to create amodern carrier force, but is a two-generation leap beyond the PLAN’sinitial choice for a carrier-capablefighter aircraft, another SAC-builtaircraft, the J-15.

TheJ-15 was not an indigenous Chinese development but a reverse-engineered copy ofthe Russian Sukhoi Su-33 carrier fighter. It also draws on an early pre-production Su-27K prototypethat SACacquired from a naval aviation research centre in then-Ukraine controlledCrimea, which was used to develop many detailed aspects of the Chinese variant.

As a 1980sdesign made almost entirely of conventional metal alloys, the J-15 also suffersfrom being the heaviest carrier-based fighter in the world.(The weight factor was one reason theRussiansdeclared their Su-33 design obsolete in 2015.)With an unassisted, non-catapult take-off, with a full fuel load, it is limited to only two tonnes of its 12-tonnes weaponcapacity — two CASIC YJ-83KASMs and two older-generation PL-8 infrared-guidedAAMs.

A PLA military source whospoke on condition of anonymity said the J-15 is so overweight that, “even the US Navy’s new generationC13-2 steam catapult launch engines that are installed onNimitz-class aircraftcarriers, would struggle to launch the aircraft efficiently.”

This has prompted SAC to pour significant resources into the J-35, which is 22,000 lbs. lighter and carries its missiles in an internalweapons bay to maintain the aircraft’s stealth signature.

More and Better Carriers

The otherhalf of the equation is the general trend that the PLAN is becoming aprogressively larger force than the US Navy. Theincreasing gap in numbers hasbeen tempered by thereality that US naval aviation is still “the great equalizer,” as oneNATO-nation intelligence officer and PLA specialist explained. (The greater tonnage and lethality of the US fleet is also an important factor.)

“The US nuclear-powered carriers — and the nuclearsubmarines as well — are what gives the US Navy this technological edge andlong-range strike capability. For yearsnow, that has compensated forthe increasing numerical mismatch between the twonavies,” he continued.

Numbers-wisethe PLANcurrently constitutes 400 warships and submarines. According to a recent US Naval War College assessment the PLAN – will increase to a combined force ofmore than 530. The pace of the PRC’s shipbuilding industryis nothing short of relentless. Between2015 and 2017 alone, China produced nearly 400,000 tonnes of naval vessels, roughlydouble theoutput of US shipyards within the same period.

Incomparison to the rapidly modernising PLAN, today’s US Navy is sometimes described asshrinking and over-extended; as of March it operated 296warships and submarines.

But US defence policymakers’ anxiety moved up several notches whenthe PLAN’s first aircraft carrier, the CV-16Liaoning, was commissioned in 2012 and declaredcombat-ready four years later.

TheLiaoningType 001A,sister ship to the Russian Navy’s(VMF)Admiral Kuznetsov, is more than a generation behind any US carrier. It relies on a ski-ramp flight deck, instead of the catapults installedon all US-design carriers.

A second,Type 002 carrier, the CV-17Shandong isa near-clone of theLiaoning.Commissioned in late 2019, it is undergoing its last set of seatrials. Western analysts say both these two carriers are really meant to be training platforms and will be replaced by a next generation of carriers that use catapults,designated the Type003.

The Type003 will be a traditional “flattop” design. With a displacement of 80,000tonnes, it is 15,000 tonnes heavier than the CV-16 and CV-17 models It is designed to be fitted with anElectromagneticAircraft Launch System (EMALS) – a next-generation catapultthat the US Navy is only now just fielding.

The Chinese catapults, which will not have a nuclear reactor to power them,is reportedly backed up byintegratedpropulsion system (IPS) technology. This is designed to createsignificant increases infuel efficiency for the ship’s conventional power plant.

Thequestion mark is just how proficient Chinese designers are with EMALStechnology.It is an innovation that theUS Navy has sunk billions into and is based on decades of experience withlaunchingand retrieving aircraft back aboard deck. In late 2017 inan interview withChina Central Television, Rear Adm. Yin Zhuo, a senior researcher at the PLANaval Equipment Research Centre, saidChina had done “hundreds of [land-based]tests” using EMALS with J-15 fighters in the past few years.

A US navalair systems contractor who spoke to Breaking Defense said tests onland and actual use at sea are still “two different realities. The US Navy’s large body of [naval aviation] know-how has greatly informed the design parametres and operational concepts for an EMALS catapult. The Chinese are now attempting to jump feet first into the EMALS-generation without any operational experience, without having passed through the generation of steam-powered catapults. which may prove to be a major technical challenge.”

Given these two Chinesemilitary innovations seemingly just over the horizon, there are thosecalling for a re-assessment of the relations between the US military and itsChinese counterpart.

“The reason we keep being ‘surprised’ bydevelopments such as J-35 and these new carriers is the complete lack oftransparency from the Chinese side – despite the long-running emphasis by theUSon military-to-military engagements with Beijing that is supposed tocreate just that,” said Fanell. “It is anear one-way street, as we receive almost no openness in return forthe insight we are providingthe PLAN. It’s well past time to re-evaluatethis practice of unaccountable arrangement.”